Relatives comfort each other in the yard of Connie Boelter, who was found bludgeoned to death in her home at 1134 N. Wood Drive in Appleton. / Post-Crescent Media

Dawn Gunderson (left) and her sister Lynn Kolling talk about their mother, Connie Boelter, during an interview with The Post-Crescent on Nov. 7, 2007, at Gunderson's home in Appleton. Connie Boelter was found dead in her home Nov. 15, 2006, in Appleton. / Dan Powers/Post-Crescent Media

Watch online

About ‘Cold Cases’

Gannett Wisconsin Media is publishing an exclusive four-week series called Cold Cases: Tracking Wisconsin’s Unsolved Murders. Cold Cases is the most comprehensive unsolved-murders project of regional and statewide interest ever assembled in a print and digital format. The Gannett Wisconsin Media Investigative Team spearheaded the project in conjunction with local reporters at all 10 Gannett Wisconsin Media news organizations, including Post-Crescent Media. The Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism in Madison also partnered with the newspapers. The intent of Cold Cases is to generate new, valuable leads and tips for Wisconsin homicide investigators. Many of them have hit roadblocks or face dead-ends. Coming Wednesday: The 1992 disappearance of Laurie Depies of Appleton. Videos and more: Follow the four-week series in print and on mobile, tablet and desktop at www.post.cr/coldcases.

A billboard for Connie Boelter was placed on the side of a large barn on State 15 in Hortonville in 2009. / Post-Crescent Media

In this undated photo provided by the Appleton police via WLUK-TV Green Bay, Connie Boelter is seen. Police have asked the FBI for help in the case of a Boelter a 56-year-old woman found beaten to death earlier this month. Boelter died of blunt force trauma to the head Nov. 15, 2006, in her home. (AP Photo/Appleton police via WLUK-TV Green Bay) / AP

More

ADVERTISEMENT

APPLETON — Connie Boelter taught her children not to let the bad actions of others ruin their day.

“That would bug her watching us going, ‘Why are they letting it get to them?’” said her son, Michael Boelter. “You can’t let what somebody did ruin your life or they win.”

Boelter’s children have every reason to be consumed with anger, frustration and grief.

Nearly seven years ago, their mother was murdered in her Appleton home, and the killer has not been caught. Police have tried to piece together who killed the 56-year-old grandmother in her duplex on Nov. 15, 2006, but have yet to solve the city’s lone unsolved murder case.

In the absence of answers, Dawn Gunderson had to find a way to cope with the persistent questions surrounding her mother’s death, and move on with her life.

“You have to. You have to let it go because it can consume you,” Gunderson said. “It’s never going to make sense to us. It’s never going to seem rational or reasonable. So it really doesn’t matter. It’s not going to bring her back.”

Gunderson found her mom just hours after someone killed her with blunt force trauma to the head. One of her mom’s co-workers at the former Wolf River Savings and Loan in Hortonville, now the Wolf River Community Bank, had called Gunderson at about 11 a.m. Nov. 15 to say they were worried because she didn’t show up for work.

Just 12 hours earlier, Gunderson had visited her mom’s house. She left the residence after Connie hemmed her grandson’s basketball jersey for the next day.

“They called me and I had a key and lived five minutes away,” Gunderson said. “I don’t remember a whole lot of it, other than I called 911 and then I called my husband to come.”

“I just remember it feeling like it took forever for somebody to come. And I’m sure it was not very long. I know I had to go out on her porch to read her address, and I know her address.”

Devastating fallout

As police officers and media descended on the neighborhood, Boelter’s three children and their families tried to figure out what happened to their happy, always laughing matriarch who raised them on her own.

(Page 2 of 3)

Questions, anger and paranoia quickly followed.

“Well, that night we all went home and it was awful,” Gunderson said. “So for the next couple of weeks we just kind of had sleepovers between my house and my sister’s house.”

It took about six months for Michael Boelter to stop waking up to any noise and triple-checking locks and alarms. It was nine months before Gunderson could slow her hyper-vigilance and constant thoughts that everyone at the store could be her mother’s killer.

While Boelter’s children want answers about what happened to their mother, they’re supportive of the efforts by Appleton police to find her killer.

“They’ve always been awesome, awesome, awesome. We can call them or email them. They always respond. They answer any questions,” Gunderson said. “I really believe it’s not as important to them to solve it, but pretty darn close as it is for us. I believe they take it very personally that it’s not solved. It’s their job to catch the person.”

The team of detectives assigned to the case is responsible for following up on tips, reviewing work already completed and eliminating loose ends in the investigation, said Lt. Mike Gostisha, head of the department’s investigation division.

“The big thing is to keep an open mind to all possible scenarios,” Gostisha said. “It’s hard to not get focused on one thing and you forget something else.”

The police department is keeping its theories and evidence close to its chest to prevent the investigation from being jeopardized. Gostisha said investigators specifically hold back details from the family and the public so it is easier to confirm future confessions or witness statements that could solve the crime.

Family members have their own theories, but they keep them silent to avoid dwelling on them.

“You could drive yourself nuts,” Michael Boelter said. “You could worry yourself to death for five years and here it’s something totally different.”

After years of dead-ends, investigators applied to have the case reviewed by the Vidocq Society, an exclusive crime-solving organization in Pennsylvania dedicated to studying cold murder cases and other unsolved crimes.

Appleton detectives presented the Boelter case to the Vidocq Society in 2011 for evaluation. A question-and-answer session followed the presentation, and several of its members followed-up with Appleton police to discuss their ideas and theories, Gostisha said.

Keeping hope alive

The Boelter case has been featured nationally on the America’s Most Wanted website, and Boelter’s family continues to keep the case in front of the public with billboards, bumper stickers and memorial fundraising events. A $10,000 reward also remains unclaimed.

“Somebody knows something and it would be great if they’d come forward and give that information,” Gunderson said. “Call the detectives and tell them. Let them decide if it’s weird or means anything or could be helpful. We don’t need to make that decision, let them do it.”

Gunderson has found what serenity she can in her mother’s death and wants justice. But she worries that finding her mother’s killer will just replace unanswered questions with unsatisfying answers.

“People always talk about closure. I don’t know, I think in some ways it’ll just create a lot more questions because, like we said, it doesn’t matter what reason they give it’s not going to make sense to us,” Gunderson said. “I think about that sometimes. They always say ignorance is bliss — you don’t have all these other things to deal with.”

If their mom’s killer is never found, they will continue to honor her by living their lives exactly as she showed them.

“I’ll be where I’m at in my life. Just accept that things happen in life and you don’t get any answers,” Michael Boelter said. “We’re lucky to have that good of a mom for that many years.”